


Call it a Family

by Northern_Star



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Kid Fic, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-22
Updated: 2012-12-22
Packaged: 2017-11-21 23:48:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/603409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northern_Star/pseuds/Northern_Star
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Taylor always knew that Jordan was keeping a secret, only he had assumed that this secret was a girlfriend...not a daughter! A daughter who was only supposed to stay with her father for a few days, but ends up remaining in Edmonton for much longer than expected, and turns all their lives upside down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Call it a Family

**Author's Note:**

> Fan art and mixes by the lovely Newfie-Dini can be found [here](http://newfie-dini.livejournal.com/41399.html). :)

From very early on, Taylor had known that Jordan was keeping some sort of a secret. It wasn't exactly very hard to figure out, what with Jordan sneaking off to Regina a few times every month, and having hushed phone conversations several times a week. There are some things a roommate can't help but notice. Jordan had a secret; Taylor just didn't know exactly what it was.

One day, while they were talking a walk, on one of their rare days off in a foreign city, Jordan made an abrupt stop to go inside a small souvenir shop. Taylor wandered in after him and watched his teammate grab a stuffed polar bear from a shelf.

"He's cute, right?" said Jordan to a confused Taylor. 

"Yeah, sure..." And just like that, something clicked in Taylor's head. "For your girl in Regina?" he asked tentatively.

Jordan looked up, startled; almost guilty looking. "Yeah," he finally said. "Yeah, you could say that." 

Taylor smiled at him. "She'll love it," he said, nodding emphatically. He patted his teammate on the back.

This was what all the hushed phone calls and the frequent trips to Regina were about. It also explained Jordan's newfound fondness for stuffed animals -- pink ones, especially. 

He'd never talked about it before, and still didn't after that day, but that was okay, really. Jordan was entitled to his private life. Taylor had never asked for details before nor would he ever start — he was a better friend than that — but it was reassuring to know that there was nothing mysterious going on, and nothing to worry about, either.

Jordan simply had a girlfriend back in Regina. 

At least, as far as Taylor had understood...

~~~~~

Taylor hadn't been prepared at all for the scene he walked in on, upon entering the apartment he shared with Jordan. In fact, Taylor had expected to find the apartment empty, being that it was mid-August, and he'd come back to Edmonton a lot earlier than he'd originally planned. 

But the apartment was far from being empty. In fact, the living room floor was littered with toys. And right there, by the fireplace, sat Jordan with a little blond girl on his lap. A little blond girl who couldn't have been more than three.

"Hey," said Taylor, looking in confusion at the scene before him.

Jordan's head snapped up immediately. "Oh, sh--" he started, immediately slapping a hand over his mouth. "Sorry, uh, hi," he finally said. "I didn't think you'd be back so soon."

"Hello," said the child tentatively, big blue eyes staring at Taylor in wonder.

"Hi there," Taylor replied, attempting a smile. He looked to Jordan again, a confused expression slowly returning to his face. "I guess your girlfriend is visiting, then?" No one else was in the room, but that didn't really mean anything.

There was a long and awkward pause during which the child ventured away from Jordan, taking a few careful steps in Taylor's direction. 

"I don't have a girlfriend," Jordan eventually replied as he got to his feet and picked the little girl up, looking very much as though he'd done this countless times before. With a small sigh he explained, "This is Madison. My daughter." 

Taylor spent a long moment alternately looking at his roommate then at the child he held in his arms. "I guess that explains the teddy bears," he finally said for lack of anything smarter.

Jordan's cheeks turned a brighter shade of pink. "Yeah," he confessed, then looked to the child and gently added, "Maddy, that's Taylor, he lives here with me."

"Are you my uncle?" she asked, pointing a little finger in Taylor's direction.

"Uh...?" Taylor looked to Jordan in confusion. 

"She calls all her mom's male _friends_ that," Jordan explained quickly. He shook his head. "I have no idea... Look, uh, why don't you get settled in a little, and then we can talk about all this?"

"Yeah, all right." Taylor shook his head abruptly, as if that could clear everything up and return things to the kind of normal he was used to, but when that didn't change a thing, he sighed and dragged his luggage to his bedroom.

He emptied the contents of his suitcase, dumping it carelessly into the drawers of his dresser. Then he hung his one nice suit in the closet, and stood there for several long minutes just staring at it as if it held the answers to every question in the universe. Taylor kind of wished it did, really, because the universe wasn't making a whole lot of sense to him right now. 

Instead of the girlfriend that he had assumed Jordan had, his roommate had a daughter instead. No one else knew about this, Taylor was plenty sure, and he wouldn't have known either, had he not decided to come back to Edmonton early. It didn't seem to make sense that Jordan would want to keep that a secret, but maybe it did anyway, and Taylor just couldn't figure out why. One thing he was sure of though was that nothing else could possibly surprise him more than this.

When he finally ventured back into the living room, Taylor noticed that the toys that were previously littered across the floor had now been put away. The child — Madison — was sitting on the couch, eyes glued to some animated cartoon playing on TV while she clutched a purple giraffe in her little hands. Jordan was perched on the couch's armrest, looking nervous.

"Not quite the homecoming you expected, huh?" said Jordan as Taylor sat down a little further away. "I'm sorry, I really didn't think you'd be back so soon."

"My fault, I should have bothered to tell you I'd changed my mind," Taylor replied with a shrug. 

They'd kept in contact all summer long, texting and tweeting one another about the most random things, but somehow they'd never discussed moving back to Edmonton. Taylor had simply assumed that Jordan would stay in Regina with his girlfriend as long as he possibly could; except of course every last bit of that assumption had turned out to be wrong. 

Taylor looked over to the small child who seemed to be completely entranced with the cartoon playing on TV. "She's really cute," he said with a smile. 

Jordan cast a quick glance over to her as well. "Yeah she is," he said, his words tinted with the kind of admiration Taylor had often seen in people when they spoke of their kids. "It's so strange that you know... I've never told anyone outside my family." The words barely out of his mouth, Jordan's eyes went wide. "You're not going to tell anyone else, are you?"

"Dude, chill! Of course I won't."

Jordan smiled with relief. "She'll only be here until the end of next week, when her mom picks her up again and they'll go back to Regina," he went on to explain. "I'll make sure she doesn't get in your way too much while she's here."

"Oh, uh... it's okay, I don't mind," Taylor immediately offered. Surely he could survive a week and a half in the same living space as a young child. How hard could that possibly be?

~~~~~

Taylor hit the pause button on the movie he was watching, then reached for his ringing cellphone on the bedside table. He smiled at the display which read "Jonesy."

"Hey, Jonesy-boy, what's up? You back in town?" Taylor said as he answered the call.

"Yeah man, just got back in the YEG," said Ryan on the other end. "Feel like going out for a couple beers?"

"Okay, sure, let me just check with Ebs and—"

Ryan clicked his tongue. "And what, ask for permission? God you guys are so married!"

"No, you idiot, but maybe he'd like to come along," said Taylor in a long sigh.

"All right, all right, ask your wife and call me back?"

"Yeah, yeah," Taylor replied as he ended the call and stuffed the phone into his jeans' pocket.

He padded out of his room and over to the living room, but there was no one there, only the ever present pile of toys on the floor, and some kiddy show paused on the TV. Taylor grabbed the stuffed bear that was lying face first on the couch and sat down in its place. The display on the DVR read 8:04.

When Jordan walked into the room, the first words out of his mouth (a habit, these last few days) were, "Hey man, sorry for the mess." He grabbed a box that was sitting on the side of the couch and started tossing toys into it.

"Heh." Taylor shrugged. "It's not a big deal." He lobbed the teddy bear he was still holding, into the box with Madison's other toys. "How do you not get bored of that stuff?" he asked, pointing to the annoyingly happy looking cartoon characters paused on the TV screen.

"What makes you think I actually watch it?" Jordan snorted in response. "Besides, that one's not the worst there is."

"I'd rather not find out, thank you," Taylor replied in a chuckle. "Anyway, so Jonesy's back in town and wants to go out for beer tonight, you in?"

"Um, yeah, not happening. Even if I had any idea where to find a sitter, this is just way too last minute."

"Oh. Right, of course, that was stupid of me." Taylor pulled out his phone and started typing a message to Jonesy. He could just go have beer without them. Surely he could find some other teammates to go along, anyway.

"Doesn't mean you can't go, you know."

"Yeah," Taylor sighed, "but it's not the same. Jonesy makes a lousy wingman, picking up girls is much more fun with you."

Jordan slid down on the couch next to his roommate. "Hallsy, we _never_ pick up girls together."

"Well no, _you_ don't," Taylor argued, "but that's just because—" he paused abruptly, remembering that Jordan didn't actually have a girlfriend, as he'd originally believed. "Wait... you know girls dig single dads, right? You could be a real chick magnet if you played that card."

"Taylor, I don't _want_ to be a chick magnet," Jordan replied, making air quotes around the expression.

Taylor shook his head, then looked at the display of his phone which had just beeped at him. "Jonesy says it's disgusting how married we are," he said in a chuckle, as he shot a quick answer back to their teammate. "You know, having a kid doesn't mean you can never date again, dude."

"Wow, thanks for the tip, I wasn't aware," said Jordan sarcastically. "Just because you haven't noticed doesn't mean I haven't been dating."

"Oh please, I've never even seen you with a girl once since we've been in Edmonton!"

Jordan sighed and ran a hand across his face, looking strangely conflicted. He looked at Taylor again, sighed once more, and finally admitted, "I don't date girls, Hallsy."

"Yeah, that's what I'm saying!"

"No... I mean I don't date _girls_ ," Jordan explained, dragging the last word out. "Taylor? I'm gay."

Taylor frowned, then finally laughed, convinced that this was a joke. "Yeah, good one," he said. "Clearly you're into girls, or Maddy wouldn't be around. Duh."

"Yeah, that's...kind of complicated," Jordan told him, shaking his head. "But I'm really not into girls. At all."

"Oh." Taylor frowned, staring at the floor as he tried to make sense of this and of the fact that apparently he didn't know the first thing about Jordan at all. 

"Look, I'm sorry if this makes things awkward between us..."

Taylor looked up. "Awkward?" he echoed, frowning still. "I... No, it's not awkward. Just, I thought I knew you, Ebs, and turns out everything I thought I knew was really a lie. I thought we were friends?"

Jordan let his head fall on the back of the couch and stared at the ceiling for a moment. "We _are_ friends," he said, his voice a little thick. "You're the closest friend I have." He looked to Taylor again before adding, "And I never _lied_ to you... I just told you certain facts to keep you from finding out about certain other facts." He sighed. "There's so much I don't want people to find out about, you know? I'm not ashamed, I'm just...I'm afraid, okay? I could lose everything. But you're right, though, and I should have known I could trust you, of all people."

"Damn straight."

"Okay, look," Jordan began, getting up from the couch, "if you're absolutely sure you don't want to go party it up with Jonesy, I'll get us a couple beers from the fridge and then I'll tell you everything you want to know."

Taylor laughed, getting up as well. "Everything? Dude, that's going to require a lot more than just a couple beers," he said.

"Yeah, well, maybe _you_ need more, but I'm not getting pissed drunk when my kid's sleeping in the next room."

"Look at you, all responsible parent and everything," Taylor teased. "I didn't mean that we needed to get drunk for this, only I have a feeling this is going to take a while, and two beers is exactly what's left in the fridge. I'll be back in less time it'll take you to put the rest of Maddy's toys away."

Laughing, he slipped out of the apartment.

~~~~~

Jordan picked up the toys that remained and placed them into the cardboard box he'd been using to store them. He glimpsed a little pink pony lying halfway under the couch, picked it up and tossed it with the others, then took a circular glance around the room. There didn't seem to be any left anywhere, so he pushed the box to the side of the couch and sat, waiting for Taylor to come back.

Fifteen minutes later, he was still sitting, staring blankly at the fireplace and waiting for Taylor. By then Jordan was getting restless and nervous. Especially nervous. What if Taylor had changed his mind and he'd gone partying with Jonesy after all? Or worse, what if he'd decided he couldn't handle Jordan's truths — or that he'd hidden them from him — and that they couldn't be friends anymore after this?

Filled with guilt and a growing sense of despair, Jordan debated calling Taylor and checking to make sure he was indeed coming back. But, afraid that this might completely backfire and actually drive Taylor away, Jordan got up from the couch instead and started tidying up the living room; anything to keep himself from over-analyzing everything. If Taylor had told him he'd come back, then he would. He trusted him to. And he'd trust him with the truth from now on, too. 

Just as Jordan was putting away the box of toys in the mostly empty guest room off the side of the kitchen, he heard the front door open. He sighed with relief and came back to sit on the couch, forcing a relaxed expression on his face.

"Hey, sorry," said Taylor as he walked through the living room on his way to the kitchen. "I ended up going to the supermarket when I remembered we were out of Corn Flakes."

"Oh, good call."

Taylor spent a few minutes putting things away, then came back out to the living room. "All right," he said, handing Jordan a beer, "now spill." He laughed as he sank into the living room couch. "I don't mean the beer..."

Jordan gave him a nervous half-smile. "Uh, okay. What, uh—" he cleared his throat "—what would you like me to tell you about?"

"Anything else really huge that you're hiding?"

"Nothing else besides what I've told you already," Jordan assured him. "And I'm sorry I never told you the truth about it before, it's just hard sometimes knowing who to trust when there's so much on the line."

"I'm not going to spill your secrets to anyone, Ebs, I swear."

"I know, and I promise I'll always tell you the truth from now on."

"Fair enough," said Taylor before taking a swig of his beer. "You know, the only thing I'm really curious about is Madison... If you're not into girls, then what is she, like...adopted?"

Jordan smiled. "No, she's really mine," he said. "Christine, her mom, was one of my best friends in high school. Still a close friend, actually. She was the first person outside my family I ever came out to..." He laughed ruefully, remembering the conversation. "She didn't believe a word of it at first, thought I was making it up just to tease."

"Weird how that sounds familiar..." 

"Don't worry about it, apparently it's everyone's reaction," Jordan told him, then took a long sip from his beer. "I guess hockey players aren't supposed to be gay? Go figure. Anyway... to make a really long story short, there was a party one night, and a lot of beer — we weren't even legal at the time — and somehow she got it into her head that she could change my mind or something. Well, maybe not change it, but—" he made air quotes "—how could I know for sure that I was gay if I'd never been with a girl before."

"And you weren't sure?" 

"Oh no, no, I was sure all right," Jordan told him, shaking his head. "But I was curious, I guess? And she was determined." He chuckled. "And did I mention there was a _lot_ of beer? Enough that I don't even remember most of it, and that neither of us even realized the condom had ripped until a few weeks later."

Taylor cocked his head to the side a moment, frowning in thought. "What if it didn't though, and you only think—"

"Yeah, that's what my folks said too when I told them," Jordan immediately replied, knowing where Taylor's train of thought was leading him. "But no, no, it really did, and I have a piece of paper that proves Madison is really my daughter."

"Oh."

"Yeah..." Jordan shrugged. "But you know, in retrospect? I really wouldn't change a thing. I mean, I wish I could spend more time with Maddy, though all things considered I suppose I'm lucky I didn't end up in Florida or somewhere else that's ridiculously far from Regina. But I couldn't imagine my life without her in it, and I don't think I want to, you know?"

"I suppose, yeah," Taylor agreed, "And I guess it makes sense she lives with her mom since we're on the road so much and all... But why not move out here? I mean, I get that you don't want people to _know_ but they could be a little closer to here anyway, no?"

"We talked about it, but raising Madison was a big enough sacrifice to make, I just couldn't ask her to quit her classes as well and move out here just to make _me_ happy."

"You know there are schools in Edmonton, right? Way bigger city, way more schools."

"Yeah, no joke," Jordan snorted in response, "You think I hadn't noticed? Only apparently the music professors are better at U of R."

"Music?" Taylor asked in disbelief.

"Christine is a cellist," Jordan explained. Taylor raised an eyebrow, prompting Jordan to argue that she was actually pretty damn talented, thank you very much, and being that he was a hockey player, he didn't really see how he was in any position to judge someone else's choice of career. "She's in Italy with some classmates now, they're on some sort of concert field trip or something. I forget exactly... I only know she's in Rome this week, and she's coming back in five days."

"And then you'll start going to Regina every few weeks again..."

"Yep." Jordan chugged down what was left of his beer and set the bottle down on the coffee table. "Things could be a lot worse, you know," he added with a forced smile. 

Jordan knew how lucky he was to be playing in one of the closest NHL cities to Regina, and how fortunate it was that Maddy's mother had been — and remained — a close friend. He knew he might just as easily have ended up halfway around the world from there, or with only the most basic visiting rights; but he hadn't, and he was thankful, because life without Madison just seemed impossible to him now.

~~~~~

Noises coming from the living room woke Taylor up abruptly that morning. Ebs seemed to be talking with someone — and from the sounds of it, he wasn't exactly happy. After a quick glance at his alarm clock — and, damn it was early — Taylor stumbled out of bed and into the living room to see what the matter was. Maybe he could help?

"Chris, no! You can't do that. You can't ask me—" There was a quick pause, then a little louder, and more insistently, Jordan went on, "No, Chris, dammit, you're not listening! You're not giving me any—" Another short pause, then, "You can't do that to me, Chris! Chris? Godammit, Chris—" He shut off his phone and tossed it angrily on the couch.

"What's up?" Taylor asked, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. "Boyfriend trouble?"

Jordan cast him a quick glance, frowning. "What? No... Maddy's mom. Christine...?" he said. He looked distraught, a little lost, even.

"Oh, oh!" Taylor snacked his forehead with the heel of his hand. "Is something wrong?"

"You think?" Jordan snapped. Then he sighed and explained, "She wants to stay in Rome. Says she met a composer and he wants her as his understudy, and she plans on staying there about a year or so." The more he explained, the more worked up he got. "And she wants to pretend like she's giving me a fucking _choice_ , between sending Maddy over there to stay with her, or keeping her here. What kind of a choice is that? I can't keep her here, and she knows that! The only choice I've got now is to let her take my kid away from me. I can't— Fuck!" 

Jordan grabbed his set of keys from the kitchen counter. "I need to think. I need some air, and I need to think. This can't be happening!" With that he got out of the apartment, just about slamming the door shut behind him.

Taylor stared at the closed door, eyes wide. He couldn't even begin to imagine how Jordan had to be feeling about this whole thing. Taylor had seen him with Madison over the last week or so, and it was so clear she was the center of his universe — he'd been keeping things secret for fear of losing her, even, and yet apparently it was going to happen anyway? Taylor felt absolutely sick at the idea.

As he padded back toward his bedroom, he saw Maddy standing in the doorway of Jordan's room. She was clutching her fluffy purple giraffe tightly in her arms, and her face was streaked with tears. She'd likely been awoken by the shouting but had been too afraid to come out of the room completely.

"Hey, Princess," said Taylor, walking toward her. "It's too early for you to be up... Let's go back to bed, okay?" 

"Why did Daddy leave?"

Taylor crouched down to her level and ran a hand down her cheek. "Don't worry, sweetie," he told her, "he'll be back, I promise."

"Is he angry at me?" she asked in a small voice, her lower lip quivering.

"Oh, Princess, no, of course he's not angry at you," Taylor said, feeling awful for her. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly against him as he got up again. "Let's go back to bed, okay?"

Madison only sobbed in response. Slowly and carefully, Taylor lowered her down onto Jordan's bed.

"Do you want me to stay with you for a little bit?" he asked, brushing a few strands of hair out of her face.

"Yes," she hiccupped and ran a clumsy hand over her eyes to wipe the tears from them.

Taylor reached for the box of tissues on the nightstand, yanked one out then wiped Maddy's little nose carefully. "Better?"

She nodded and he climbed into bed with her, pulling the covers over them both. Still sobbing and sniffling, Maddy moved in closer and clung to him, her little face buried in the soft cotton of his t-shirt. She fell asleep only a few minutes later, after which Taylor closed his own eyes and drifted off as well, feeling only very vaguely strange for being in Jordan's bed, with his daughter in his arms, and not caring very much about whether or not Jordan would approve.

It was well over an hour before he woke up again. Maddy was still very much asleep, and so carefully Taylor moved her away so he could get out of bed. He'd managed not to wake her until he tucked the covers around her, and she suddenly jerked awake. She looked up at him, eyes wide, then around the room quickly.

"Where's Daddy?" she asked.

"I'm not sure, Princess," Taylor told her. He pulled her into his arms. "Why don't we go look for him," he suggested as he headed out of the room.

"Daddy?" Madison called, almost in a shriek, just a few inches away from Taylor's ear.

"Ouch, please don't yell in my ear," he told her, but she didn't listen and called for her dad again. Taylor lowered her to the floor and she ran off just about immediately, shouting for her dad.

Except that there was no sign of Jordan being in the apartment. Taylor guessed he hadn't come back yet.

"Daddy!" Maddy wailed, running through the apartment as fast as her little legs would allow. "Daddy, where are you?"

"He's not here yet, sweetie," Taylor called after her from the living room.

She ran back to where Taylor stood, stopping dead in her tracks right in front of him. "You promised he would come back!" she said accusingly.

"Well yeah," said Taylor, as he crouched down in front of her. "Of course he'll be back."

"He's not here," she complained, her little face turning red with frustration. "You promised he'd be back!"

"Honey, I can't make him appear out of thin air," Taylor replied, not knowing what else to tell her. Yes, of course he'd promised her that her dad would come back, but that was just a manner of speech and not an actual promise that he could fulfill — trying to explain that to her would be a waste of time, though. Obviously. "But he's going to come back," he told her, nodding and willing her to accept the fact. "You'll see. Daddy's going to come back home as soon as he can."

"But I want him now," she whined, stomping the floor angrily. "I want Daddy _now_!"

Taylor watched helplessly as Maddy started to cry again, begging for her daddy to come back now. He had absolutely no idea what he was supposed to do to calm her down. And while his first thought had been to call Jordan and ask what he was doing and why he hadn't come back home again, the fact that Jordan's cellphone was sitting on the couch, right where he'd tossed it in frustration a few hours ago, meant that Jordan was completely unreachable for the time being.

After a good half hour had gone by, during which Maddy had kept crying, and Jordan hadn't come back, Taylor did the only thing he could thing of: he grabbed his phone, looked up Jonesy's home phone number and called. Hopefully his wife would be there, and she'd know what to do. She usually did.

~~~~~

Jordan opened the door to his apartment, coming home again after having walked around the block and sat in the park for a while — a long while, he guessed, judging by the position of the sun, but he had no idea what time it was exactly. 

There were voices inside — women's voices, more than one. It didn't seem to make any sense. Why would Taylor have people over on a Thursday morning? Jordan ventured out toward the kitchen.

He stopped dead in his tracks, mouth hanging open, when he caught the first glimpse of Cindy Horcoff, with Madison in her arms. Jonesy's wife Jamie was there too. 

"Daddy!" said Madison, squirming out of Cindy's arms. She came running to Jordan, who grabbed her as she made a jumping motion, arms held up high in the air. 

Immediately Jordan set his sights on Taylor who was standing on the other side of the island in the kitchen. "How could you?" he spat angrily. "Taylor, you swore you wouldn't tell."

"What else was I supposed to do?" a stunned Taylor replied. "You left over three hours ago. What was I supposed to do when your kid started crying for her dad? Let her? Dude, you left your phone on the couch, who else should I have called?"

Jordan turned and saw the phone was where Taylor had said. He went over to pick it up and stuck it in his pocket. "You could have just _waited_ ," he insisted. "You were supposed to keep it a secret, Taylor, I trusted you."

"Ebs, you abandoned your kid here this morning, leaving me with absolutely no idea when you'd be back—"

"Of course I was going to come back! And I didn't abandon her!" Jordan shouted back.

Madison started wailing. 

"Dammit, Ebs, you know I have no idea how to care for her," Taylor objected, seemingly trying to keep his tone under control. "So yeah, I called for help, and if you calmed down you'd realize it was the smart thing to do, because trust me, I'm not qualified to potty train a two-year old!"

"You could have Googled it," Jordan snapped back petulantly, and he stormed out of the apartment, this time with Maddy along for the ride. 

~~~~~

For the second time that morning, Taylor watched helplessly as Jordan fled their home in anger. Except, this time, it was his fault. And this time, the odds that he might not come back were much higher. For one thing, because he'd left with Maddy, but for another, because he was angry enough at Taylor that he might not want to come back to the apartment they shared.

"Don't worry, hon," Jamie told him, patting him on the shoulder amicably. "He'll come around."

"You did the right thing," said Cindy. "He'll get over it when he realizes that."

"I wasn't supposed to tell anyone," Taylor replied, head bowed down. "I promised I wouldn't tell a soul. I know I did the right thing calling you, and I'm sure at some point he'll realize there was nothing else I could have done, but still... I betrayed him, and..." He shrugged. "What if he never gets over that?"

"Taylor, you're his best friend, of course he'll get over it," Jamie assured him.

"You could have done a lot worse than calling us," Cindy said and she brushed a small kiss on Taylor's cheek. "Ebs will be back when he comes to his senses again, don't worry."

Taylor sighed as Jamie went on, "It'll be okay, hon, you'll see," and both women headed out of the apartment.

"Thanks," Taylor told them, "for coming to my rescue..." 

"Call us anytime you need us, okay?" said Cindy. "And you tell him the same, all right? We're all family here, and we'll be there for you if you need us, always."

"Yeah, okay," Taylor replied, nodding though he wasn't convinced he would. "Thanks again."

He closed the door after them, standing there and staring at the doorknob in his hand for the longest time before he forced himself to move away. He'd known the moment he made the call that involving teammates' wives was as bad an idea as it was his only viable solution. He'd needed help, immediate help, from someone who could come over and make things better, not a voice on a phone line or a comment on a message board. 

He'd done the smart, responsible thing, and yet it was also the wrong thing, the worst thing. He'd betrayed a secret he'd sworn to keep, and Taylor wasn't sure Ebs would ever forgive him for it.

For a very long time, Taylor lay on the living room couch, staring blankly at the images on TV, feeling horrible and guilty, as he tried to think of a way he could possibly fix his mistake.

He still hadn't found anything by the time Jordan came back, many hours later.

Taylor heard the door slowly creak open, then Maddy happily repeating "Ice cream! Ice cream!" in a sing-song voice. He sat up on the couch, looking over toward the entrance and waited until he saw the small girl come running in.

"Taylor, Taylor," she announced, and Taylor grinned widely at the cute way she had of saying his name — without the 'L's that she couldn't quite pronounce yet. "We have ice cream! Ice cream!"

"Hey," said Jordan walking in behind his daughter. He lifted up a cardboard tray on which sat a couple of ice cream treats. "Peace offering," he explained, a hopeful look on his face.

Meanwhile, Maddy kept jumping up and down, repeating, "Ice cream! Ice cream!"

"Baby, relax," Jordan told her, "If you want some more ice cream, you have to sit down, okay?"

"Okay! Okay!" Maddy chanted, climbing up on the couch, then looking up at her father expectantly.

Taylor chuckled to himself. She was such an adorable little hurricane... It was no wonder Jordan couldn't bare to think of her leaving for Europe. Taylor would miss her quite a bit too once she was gone, he knew. Unless...

"Here," Jordan said, offering Taylor a large chocolate sundae, and abruptly pulling him out of his musings. "It melted a little," he added apologetically. "Took forever to get her back in the car..."

"So, uh..." Taylor began tentatively. He swirled the plastic spoon around the mostly liquid ice cream. "You're not angry anymore, then?"

Jordan sighed. "I shouldn't have lost it like that," he said, looking away. Then he fed Maddy a spoonful of the other sundae — strawberry, that one, and already half eaten, from the looks of it.

"But you were right, though," Taylor offered, "and I shouldn't have—"

"No, Hallsy, I was wrong," Jordan argued, feeding Maddy a second bite of melted ice cream. Then he wiped her mouth with a paper napkin and patted her gently on the back. "You want to go get some of your toys and play, honey? Daddy needs to talk with Taylor for a little while."

"Okay," said Maddy and she slid off the couch, her little summer dress riding all the way up to her chest in the process. She smoothed it down the moment she stood up properly, then she skipped over to the guest room and bent down to grab some toys from the box she liked to refer to as a treasure chest. 

"I had a lot of time to think this afternoon," Jordan told Taylor, casting quick glances in Maddy's direction. "I really shouldn't have yelled at you." 

"It's okay, you know, I understand."

Maddy came running back, her stuffed giraffe in one hand and a floppy hippo in the other. "Are these zoo animals, Daddy?" she asked.

"I took her to the zoo," Jordan explained. "Yeah, sweetie they are. We don't have any here, but they have them in other zoos."

"Can we go there next time?"

"Sure, baby, we'll go see giraffes and hippos next time," Jordan told her. 

"And zebras!" she exclaimed. At Jordan's nod, she ran back to the guest room again.

"She wants us to adopt a zebra," Jordan told Taylor, shrugging.

Taylor laughed. "We're going to need a much bigger yard..."

"Yeah, I think she'll have to settle for a stuffed one for now." Jordan ate a few bites of ice cream, then put the mostly empty cup away. "It's weird how no one seemed to care I had her with me. Pretty sure at least a few of the kids there recognized me..."

"So you have a kid," Taylor replied with a big, obvious shrug. "Big whoop. Lots of guys do, it's not like you're the first ever hockey player to reproduce you know."

"I know, I know," Jordan laughed. "It's just different than how I expected. Hey, look, I'm really sorry about earlier, by the way. I should have known better than to leave her here with you like that."

"Well, you know, on the bright side, I learned a few things on how to care for her. Not sure I'd make a great babysitter, but at least she'd be in mostly good hands with me."

"At least one of us doesn't totally fail as a responsible adult," Jordan said with a heavy sigh. "I guess for her sake it's a good thing she'll be in Italy with her mom for a while where I can't screw her up too much."

"Oh please, as if you're never supposed to make any mistakes!"

"Not like this," Jordan argued, shaking his head. "That was just...inexcusable."

"You know..." Taylor began, feeling a little nervous about the suggestion he was going to make. He'd spent a long time weighing the pros and the cons of it this afternoon, but he had no way of knowing if Jordan would see any of it the same way. "Maybe you don't _have_ to let her go," Taylor finally explained. "She could stay right here in Edmonton."

"What, and I should drag her around on the road with me, perhaps? That makes no sense."

"Yeah, _that_ makes no sense," said Taylor rolling his eyes. "You can hire a babysitter, or a nanny, even. Cindy gave me some numbers. Keeping Maddy here isn't impossible, Ebs, it's totally doable. And Christine is giving you a choice, isn't she? Then why not make this one, why not keep your daughter here with you?"

"For the same reason I haven't done it before, Hallsy," Jordan replied, shaking his head. "Because it just wouldn't work."

"Yes, it can," Taylor insisted. "If you want it to, it can. Ebs, she's not even gone, and I can tell how miserable you'd be about it. Tell me I'm wrong. Tell me you can actually go even a month without seeing her. You can't, you'll be mopey and heartbroken, and let's not get into what that's going to do to your game."

"I know, I know."

"Then, just hire a nanny, and keep Maddy here," said Taylor. "We'll buy furniture and turn the guest room into an actual room for her. And then the rest we can always figure out together later."

Jordan blinked at him. "Together?" he echoed, looking like the concept was too abstract to grasp.

"Well, what? You don't expect me to abandon you and move out, do you?"

"Wouldn't you rather have your own space? It'd be pretty cramped in here, three adults and a miniature tornado..."

Taylor shrugged. "I'm pretty sure I'm not mature enough to live on my own yet. Besides, if I'm making the suggestion, you should assume it's because I've thought about it and I'm okay with it."

"I guess—" Jordan started, then paused for a moment. He ran a hand through his hair. "I guess we could give that a try for a little while and see."

"It'll work, you'll see," Taylor assured him. Between the two of them — and a nanny — he was pretty sure they could make it work. Besides, in the week and a half that she'd been around, he'd kind of fallen in love with Maddy, and he didn't think he wanted her to leave any more than Jordan did.

~~~~~

Hiring a nanny proved to be a lot more complicated than Jordan had ever anticipated. Much to Taylor's displeasure, Jordan had pretty much automatically turned down all the pretty young girls — damned if he was going to sit around and watch his roommate flirt with his kid's nanny! Jordan knew it was bound to happen if he hired anyone close enough to Taylor's age, so he didn't.

Maddy hadn't seemed to like any of the older women who had applied, and the one _guy_ who had, though he was perfect for the task and Madison had seemed to like him just fine, Taylor had objected to. Petulantly, at that. Probably just because Jordan kept objecting to younger girls, in fact. And while Jordan didn't figure Taylor really ought to get a vote on who should be hired to take care of Maddy, he also couldn't just ignore him... They shared the apartment, after all.

Ultimately, Jordan had hired a 25-year-old woman whose husband had recently been deployed overseas. Jennifer was pretty, but she was _married_ ; Maddy had liked her pretty much straight away; and she didn't seem to know or care very much about hockey, which all things considered, was a pretty huge plus. But even better was the fact she lived a couple of blocks away and hadn't needed, or even wanted, to move in with them full time, preferring instead to be around when she was needed and spend her free time in her own home and her own space. 

Training camp was already well underway by the time they'd found and hired her, though, and between practice sessions at the rink and all the time they'd spent interviewing potential nanny candidates, they'd barely had time to make a few trips to IKEA to buy what they needed to properly furnish the guest bedroom. The furniture still sat in its boxes, none of it assembled yet, on the day of their first pre-season game.

They were playing split-squad games that evening, with half the team in Edmonton hosting the Wild, and the other half in Saskatoon, facing off against the Blackhawks. Jordan had ended up with the group traveling to Saskatchewan.

It was well past 1 a.m. by the time he finally got home again. Quietly, he crossed the apartment and headed toward his bedroom, gently pushing the door open. The room was almost completely dark, illuminated only by Maddy's nightlight, but it was plenty enough for him to notice the adult-shaped form sleeping on the king-sized bed.

Of course Jennifer was sleeping in his bed... Taylor had to have gotten home late, too, and she had probably already been asleep at the time. Where else was she supposed to crash, when they hadn't bothered assembling the IKEA furniture yet? Jordan closed the door again — not completely, because Maddy hated it that way — and slowly headed away from his bedroom. 

It was definitely too late now to start building the bed they'd bought — he was too tired to even truly consider it anyway — and there wasn't enough space left in the guest room to set the mattress on the floor and sleep there. So, Jordan grabbed some clean sheets from the linen closet, turned a light on in the living room and unfolded the sheets over the couch. He had no pillow, though, and none of the couch cushions could be used that way. They didn't have any spares anywhere, the only one they had was now Maddy's... He made a note to buy some for the guest room as soon as possible.

Jordan tried to get comfortable without a pillow anyway, but bad enough he was sleeping on their narrow couch, he wasn't going to get any sleep this way. Reluctantly he got up again, then quietly slipped into Taylor's bedroom.

"Hey," he said, gently shaking his roommate awake. "You mind if I steal one of your pillows?"

"Uh? What?" Taylor asked, startled. "What's going on?"

"Nothing, it's all right," said Jordan reassuringly. "I didn't mean to scare you. I just wanted to borrow a pillow."

Taylor sat up, rubbing his eyes. "Why? You already have two."

"Yeah, but Jenn has those."

"Huh?"

Jordan sat on the edge of the bed. "Jenn is sleeping in my bed. You had to have noticed when you came home, right?"

"Oh, yeah, yeah," Taylor replied slowly. "She's still here?"

"What was I supposed to do? Wake her at one in the morning and throw her out so I could sleep in my bed, because we're too lazy to have the IKEA stuff built up already?"

"Uh, good point." Taylor reached back to grab one of his pillows, but stopped mid-motion. "Wait, so where _are_ you sleeping, then?"

"Couch, where else?"

"Seriously?" Taylor asked, frowning at him. "You're going to screw up your back on there." He pulled the covers down and moved to the far side of his bed. "Climb in, at least you'll sleep well."

"I'm not sleeping in your bed," Jordan objected. Not that it didn't sound tempting, but it sounded like a bad idea on every count he could possibly think of. A very bad idea.

"Are you afraid I'll come on to you or something?"

Jordan's eyes went wide. "What?"

"Dude, I'm kidding!" said Taylor in a chuckle. "Just climb in, Ebs, there's plenty of space here, and at least you can get a good night's sleep."

"All right, fine," Jordan sighed in response. Sleeping on the couch was a bad idea and he knew it for having fallen asleep there a few times in the past. Maybe sleeping here was a bad idea as well, but it did have a few positive aspects, at least. He climbed onto the bed and stretched out, making sure to lie as far from Taylor as he possibly could. "Thanks."

"Sure thing," Taylor replied as he pulled the sheets back up over them both. "We'll fix up the guest room tomorrow after practice."

"You have practice? I don't."

"Yeah, cause you guys won your game, Mr. First Star of the Game."

"Pfft, you guys didn't do all that bad."

Taylor snorted softly. "Right up until I ended up in the box and they scored the game winning goal..."

"Ah, come on, it's only pre-season," Jordan told him. "We'll be awesome when the actual season starts, you'll see."

"Oh man, I hope so!" Taylor turned on his side, then looked over his shoulder. "Goodnight." 

"'Night, Hallsy. And thanks."

"Anytime," Taylor whispered before pulling the sheet over his head. 

Jordan watched him for a little while, wondering how he'd ever ended up with such a great guy for a friend. 

~~~~~

Taylor woke to the sounds of Ebs snoring softly next to him. He smiled to himself, happy in the knowledge that his roommate had managed to get some sleep, in part thanks to him. 

When he realized he'd been staring, and for quite a while at that, Taylor quickly but quietly got out of bed. He padded over to the kitchen and fixed himself a heaping bowl of Corn Flakes, setting it down on the island and absently taking a few spoonfuls. His mind was somewhere else. Somewhere in the vicinity of his bedroom and the guy still sleeping in his bed.

Shaking his head sharply, Taylor tried to focus on his breakfast. He couldn't be crushing on Ebs, that was...that was just an awful idea. Awful, awful idea. 

Oh, who was he kidding? He'd had a thing for Ebs pretty much since they'd moved in together last season. It wasn't a new concept at all; except it had been so much easier to ignore when Taylor thought his roommate had a girlfriend. 

Now, however...

Frustrated with himself, Taylor pushed the bowl of cereal aside — he wasn't hungry, so what was the point? — and marched over to the guest room. He was pretty sure there was no way he could figure out how to build all this damn furniture by himself, but he sure as hell was going to give it a try if for no other reason than to keep his mind busy.

He'd been at it for less than a half hour when a certain little blond girl came charging into the room. She stopped abruptly when she saw Taylor sitting there on the floor, a screwdriver in hand and a dozen or so wooden boards around him.

"You're making something?" Madison asked, eyes as big as saucers as she looked around.

"Trying to build the bed we bought," Taylor explained, holding up the instruction leaflet as though that would serve to prove his intent. "I'm not very good at it, though," he confessed.

Maddy ran out of the room just as quickly as she'd come, leaving Taylor to wonder why she hadn't taken any of the toys from her "treasure chest", which he'd assumed was the reason she'd come in the room to begin with. He shrugged, knowing it was no use trying to figure out the actions of a child then went back to solving the puzzle of this IKEA furniture.

He'd barely made any progress when, some fifteen minutes later, Maddy came back, dragging both her father and her nanny along with her.

"I got help," she announced proudly.

Taylor smiled, feeling a little embarrassed. "Thanks," he said. Then mostly to himself, added, "I probably need a lot of it."

They got to work while Maddy sat a little out of the way and played with some of her toys. Between the three of them — including one who actually knew what the heck she was doing — the adults managed to get the bed and dresser assembled within the next hour. 

They'd also gotten a bedside table and an actual chest in which to store Maddy's toys, but Taylor had to leave to get to the rink before they could start putting those together. It was all right, though, since the heavy stuff had all been taken care of. That, and he really sucked at putting these things together anyway. 

And now he wouldn't have to worry about waking up with Ebs sleeping next to him which, Taylor figured, was definitely for the best.

~~~~~

It was early November, and the Oilers were on their first real road trip of the season. The team's charter plane was just about to board in Montreal when Jordan's phone rang.

"It's Jennifer," he told Taylor, frowning, before he took the call and headed a little further away from the rest of their teammates.

Taylor watched him grow obviously more worried by the second as he spoke to Jenn, then come back with the air of someone whose dog had been run over.

"What's wrong?" Taylor immediately asked.

"Jenn says Maddy's sick..."

"Oh? How sick?"

"I'm not sure," Jordan replied, looking a little lost. "She already had the sniffles before we left, but she's been running a pretty high fever since last night. Jenn says it's probably just the flu, but she's taking her to the see the doctor this morning."

"She'll be fine," Taylor told him, patting him on the back. "Come on, we need to get on this plane."

"What if she's not, though? She might be really sick, and I'm not there."

"Ebs, relax," said Taylor gently leading Jordan in the direction of the gate. "It's probably just the flu like Jenn says, and you can check on Maddy as soon as we land in Boston. Okay?" 

Taylor knew that getting Jordan to stop stressing over this would take more than just a few soothing words, but there wasn't a lot more he could do. There wasn't a lot more Jordan himself could do from all the way here on the East Coast, either. Thankfully, the flight to Boston was a short one.

It was so short, in fact, that when the plane landed in Boston and Jordan called Jenn for an update, he found that Maddy hadn't seen the doctor yet. Jenn had put her on the phone, though, which had seemed to bring Jordan at least some relief, though he'd kept anxiously checking his phone for messages the entire way from the airport to the hotel.

"Look, Jenn said she'd call you as soon as she had any news," Taylor began in an effort to keep Jordan from driving himself insane, uselessly checking his phone. "When they get home again, we'll set up a Skype session, and you can talk to Maddy face to face."

"Yeah, okay, good idea," Jordan replied absently. He was sitting on the edge of the bed in their hotel room, still obsessively toying with his phone.

Sighing, Taylor walked over and forcibly took the phone away from Jordan. "Ebs," he said, firmly but gently, "there's nothing more you can do right now. Jenn promised she would call you with information when she had any, and you have to trust that she's going to do exactly that."

"But you don't understand!" Jordan argued as he tried to get to the phone that Taylor was attempting to keep out of his reach. "Maddy's sick, and I'm not there to take care of her."

"That's why you hired Jennifer. You trust her to take good care of Madison, don't you?"

"Yes, but—"

"Oh, come on, Ebs..." Taylor insisted. "This can't possibly be the first time Maddy's ever had the flu, and I'm willing to bet you weren't there every single time she did before."

"Well no, of course not," said Jordan, a little mollified. "But her mom was always there, and now—" 

Jordan's phone started ringing just then, and Taylor tossed it to him. Just as everyone had thought from the start — everyone but Jordan, apparently — Maddy simply had the flu. Some rest, lots of fluids, and medication the doctor had prescribed, and she would be as good as new in no time. In fact, she would already be a lot better by the time the road trip came to an end, and the Oilers got back in Edmonton, in four days.

In the meantime, Taylor figured maybe he could ask a few of the guys to try and see if they couldn’t help Jordan deal with the situation better. Granted, none of them were single dads, but they did know how it felt to be away from home and wonder if you weren't failing as a parent. 

Between that, daily updates from Jenn, and Skype sessions with Maddy, maybe he could help keep Jordan from worrying himself to death. Hopefully.

This parenting thing...Taylor really couldn't figure why people wanted to put themselves through it.

~~~~~

They'd come home in the middle of the night — a pretty regular occurrence after a road trip — and upon getting there, Jordan had just about rushed to his bedroom to check on Maddy. Except she wasn't sleeping in her bed, and Jordan had a moment of panic at the sigh of the little bed, empty and not even slept in.

Heading back out of his room in a hurry, he almost rammed right into Taylor who was on his way to his own room.

"Whoa, where's the fire?" said Taylor as he dodged the imminent collision. 

"Maddy's not in her bed," Jordan replied. He waited a moment for Taylor to get out of the way, then sighing in frustration, added, "Will you let me through already?"

"Dude, relax, she probably just went to snuggle with Jenn."

"Probably, but I won't find out unless you let me go check," Jordan snapped back angrily, though he was making an effort to keep his voice down.

Taylor opened his mouth, then after a pause just closed it again and shook his head. He moved out of the way, making an overly theatrical gesture to show the passage was clear. Jordan gave him a dirty look as he went passed and headed toward the guest room.

A quick glance through the partially open door of the guest room confirmed that Madison was, as Taylor had suggested, snuggling with Jenn. She was still sick, after all, and was likely to be more cuddly than usual. Still, he wished she'd been sleeping in her own bed, so he might have been able to check on her better, maybe kiss her forehead and tuck her in. He'd get all day tomorrow with her, though; tomorrow which was only a few hours away.

As he reached Taylor's bedroom, on the way back to his own, Jordan thought about stopping to apologize — he'd overreacted and he knew it. The door was closed though, which wasn't much like Taylor at all, and Jordan figured maybe there was a reason he'd shut it. This too could probably wait until tomorrow, Jordan figured as he walked on and into his bedroom.

But the tomorrow he'd woken up to, however, wasn't exactly the one Jordan had been hoping for. Jennifer had apparently caught Madison's cold, and was sitting in the living room under a thick blanket, sipping coffee and looking completely miserable; Maddy was pouting, missing her mommy, and for some reason absolutely refusing to respond to Jordan in any way; and Taylor seemed to be giving him wide berth, possibly for fear of getting snapped at again.

For a moment, Jordan almost wished he hadn't gotten out of bed at all. His entire household seemed so unhappy it was almost depressing.

"Would anyone like some pancakes?" he asked, thinking maybe that could cheer them up a little. 

There was no real response, save for a very small nod from Jenn, but Jordan hadn't really expected his offer to be met with much enthusiasm in the first place. That didn't stop him from grabbing some eggs and milk from the fridge, some flour and sugar from the pantry, and whipping up some pancake batter anyway. 

Hoping it might earn him a few smiles, he made the entire batch of them in the shape of Mickey Mouse. They turned out to be a little on the doughy and burnt side, though drowning them in maple syrup improved their taste quite a bit anyway.

And there were smiles around the table that morning, and it made Jordan happy, but despite his best efforts, the household morale didn't seem to improve much over the next few days. 

The second half of November, with its four road games — one of which had seen Taylor injured severely enough to land himself on IR — had seemed almost interminable and Jordan was quickly learning that pancakes, apparently, couldn't quite solve every problem.

Hopefully December would be better. It had to, right?

~~~~~

Jordan came home to find Taylor asleep on the couch, with Maddy in his arms, asleep as well. The TV was still on, with TSN showing some highlights of the evening's games. After a moment's hesitation, Jordan pulled out his phone and snapped a picture. 

The quiet before the storm, he thought. It was worth taking a picture of, in case he needed to remember what it looked like later on. Besides, this was totally something he could use as blackmail material, should he ever need some. Well, all right, that, and they looked absolutely adorable together — which, of course, he wasn't going to mention; ever.

He stuffed the phone back in his pocket then reached for the remote to shut the TV off. 

The sudden loss of background noise woke Taylor up almost immediately. "Hey," he said, blinking as he tried to focus. "You're home."

"Did you let Jenn go for the night?" Jordan asked, peering into the empty guest room.

"Gave her the weekend off. She left after dinner, and then Maddy and I watched the game together."

Jordan shook his head. "Taylor, you're injured, you should be taking care of yourself..."

"Oh come on, Ebs, it's just my shoulder, I can take care of Maddy with just one arm you know, I'm not completely invalid." He shrugged with his one uninjured shoulder. "Besides, it's just a few hours while you're not around, it's really not a big deal."

Maddy started stirring then, her little eyes flying open all of a sudden. "Daddy!" she exclaimed, somehow perfectly awake. "You're here!"

She moved out of Taylor's arms, wanting to jump up and embrace her father, but in her excitement rammed her elbow just at the side of Taylor's injured shoulder. He let out a pained gasp, followed by a muffled curse.

"Oh, sh...oot," said Jordan, catching himself before he'd uttered the four letter word. He grabbed Maddy and quickly pulled her away. "See, this is exactly why you shouldn't have let Jenn go," he said.

"Oh, relax, I'll be fine," said Taylor as he gingerly ran a hand over his shoulder, wincing. At Jordan's look of disbelief, Taylor rolled his eyes. "I'll be _fine_ "

"Daddy, I saw you score!" Madison interrupted, apparently oblivious to the fact that she'd been the one to cause Taylor any pain. "Did you win the game?"

"You bet we did," Jordan told her, and he planted a kiss on the tip of her nose. "You're being nice to Taylor, aren't you, Maddy?"

"Yes," she replied, nodding emphatically. Then she rested her head on Jordan's shoulder, her little arms wrapped loosely around his neck.

"Ebs, relax," Taylor insisted. "She's been her perfect little angel self all day. All week, even."

"Yeah, that's because you've been home all week, and you give in to all her whims."

"Oh please, I'm not that big of a pushover," Taylor argued, "But I suppose it helps that I'm not a mean old dad who says no to everything."

"Hey, I'm not—"

"Ebs, I'm kidding!" Taylor cut in, a lopsided smile on his lips. "Look, whether it's because I was here or not, Maddy's been a lot happier the last few days than she's been in weeks. I'm sure she will be tomorrow as well. And besides, you're here tomorrow, so what does it really matter if I gave Jennifer some time off?"

"I'll only be around for a few hours tomorrow, we're playing the Flames."

Taylor sighed. "Look, I think you'll agree after the way November went, Jennifer deserved some time away from here. And I can totally watch over Maddy while you're gone. There are leftovers we can have for dinner and we'll watch the game together. She likes it. Besides... I'm enjoying taking care of her, okay?"

"Yeah, but Hallsy, you're injured," Jordan insisted, keeping his voice low since Maddy had fallen asleep again. "I'm going to put her to bed," he said, as he started walking away. He bit back a remark about the fact Maddy should have been in bed hours ago, and instead simply said, "This conversation isn't over." 

Taylor grumbled something in response, but Jordan paid it no attention. He put Maddy down in her bed, thankful for the fact she was already in her jammies, which meant all he had to do was pull the covers over her, turn off the light and close the door. 

On the way back, Jordan stopped in the kitchen, stuffing a large Ziplock bag with some ice and picking up a dishcloth to wrap it all in.

"Here," he said, sitting next to Taylor on the couch and setting the bundle carefully over his injured shoulder. "That should help."

"Thanks," said Taylor with a small nod, and he reached to grab the homemade ice pack. "I should probably have been wearing the sling, but Maddy insisted she needed to sit in my lap."

"You really shouldn't let her boss you around like that."

"It's kind of hard to resist when she makes that face, all hopeful smile and huge pleading eyes..."

"Tell me about it," Jordan chuckled, shaking his head.

"She's just adorable." Taylor smiled and moved the icepack around on his shoulder. "Dude, you should have seen how crazy excited she got when you scored."

"Yeah?"

"I mean...I had to tell her that was you, because it's all a little too fast for her to follow, right?" Taylor explained. "But then she was all clapping and cheering, and she started doing fist pumps when she saw you do it on the replay, it was such a riot!"

"I've never watched a game with her before..."

"Oh." Taylor looked completely deflated. "Sorry, should I not have done that? It's not like missing her first steps, though, is it?"

Jordan shrugged. "Wouldn't know," he said. "I missed those and pretty much all the other firsts you can think of. But then hockey would have been hard anyway — when I'm with her, it's 'cause I'm not playing. Mind you, I'd rather think if she's going to watch a game it's one I'm playing in."

"Well, she loved it," Taylor assured him. "Until she dozed off after the first intermission, but she saw your goal. I'll try and take some pictures tomorrow night."

"I'll try to score, then."

"Shouldn't be that hard. You've got three in three now? You're on a roll."

"Dude, don't jinx it!" Jordan warned him. "I'm going to head off to bed. Are you sure you don't want me to ask Jenn to come back tomorrow?"

"It's fine, Ebs," Taylor replied. "I'm getting pretty good at this kid stuff, you know. Besides, Maddy's been in a great mood lately and I really like spending time with her. She's like a miniature version of you, except much more adorable."

Jordan laughed and got up, heading slowly over to his bedroom. He checked that Maddy was properly tucked in her bed then slipped out of his clothes and into his own bed. 

Phone in hand, he stared at the picture he'd taken of Taylor with Madison. He was glad to know they were getting along, that Maddy had gotten excited about the game tonight, and that Taylor apparently wanted to take care of her himself. 

He smiled at the snapshot of his little family, but then his brow creased and he quickly set the phone down. Family? That was his _roommate_ , a mutually beneficial but temporary arrangement. He wasn't supposed to start thinking of Taylor as his... his significant other. Jordan scoffed quickly at the idea, and settled into bed more comfortably. 

And maybe he looked at the picture again later, but that was simply because he wanted to know what time it was, and the photo happened to be on his phone, just a few taps on the touch-screen away. 

That really didn't mean anything. 

~~~~~

They'd gotten a Christmas tree because Madison had insisted on it. How would Santa know where to place the presents if there wasn't a tree, she'd said. So that morning, they'd gone to pick a tree — a real one — then spent the entire afternoon at the mall, letting Maddy choose the decorations she thought looked the prettiest, and trying not to veto every one of her picks.

"Are you even going to be around for Christmas?" Taylor asked later that night, as he and Jordan were relaxing in front of the TV, with the fully decorated Christmas tree illuminating the entire living room.

"We're not leaving for Vancouver until the morning of the 26th," Jordan told him absently.

"Yeah, I know... That's not what I meant."

"Huh?"

"I meant, will you be _here_ for Christmas?" Taylor clarified. "You know, as opposed to flying home to see your family for a bit?" He felt foolish asking about Jordan's holiday plans, as if it were really any of his business. But then, they'd gotten a tree, and decorated it because Maddy wanted one, and it seemed like a gigantic waste if there was no one around to enjoy it at all...

"I haven't really thought about it yet," Jordan replied, still absorbed by the movie they were watching. "I suppose going home might be a good idea."

"Oh. Okay..." Taylor mumbled, hoping not to sound as though he was sad about it. Because he was really, really trying not to be.

"Wait—" Jordan started abruptly, sitting up straight. "You're going to be here all alone, aren't you?"

"Nah, I can hang out with Nuge and Jonesy or something," Taylor replied with a dismissive wave of the hand. "I was just wondering, since we went through the trouble of getting this tree and all. It seems like kind of a waste if no one's here for Christmas."

"We could stay, you know, if you—" Jordan began, then stopped as Maddy walked into the living room, dragging her floppy hippo along, her face smeared with tears. "Baby, what's wrong?" he asked her.

"M'scared," she hiccupped in reply.

"Did you have a bad dream?"

She nodded, sniffling soundly.

"Aw, Princess, come and sit with us," Taylor told her, tapping the empty space on the couch between himself and Jordan. "We'll protect you from the monsters."

Maddy sniffled again, then slowly walked up to the couch.

Jordan leaned in and picked her up, hugging her tightly. "It's okay, honey, you're safe." He held her for a few minutes then set her down on the couch. "You can watch a little bit of TV with us if you like."

"Okay," she said in a small voice, her floppy hippo held tightly in her little hands.

"Look," said Taylor, as he pointed to the screen, "it's your friend Frosty." He'd paused the rather violent movie they'd been watching and had started up Frosty the Snowman instead.

Jordan mouthed a "Thank you," to which Taylor smiled, and for a little while they sat and watched the cartoon together. They'd watched it so many times in the last few days that Taylor knew the dialog by heart, but he was pretty sure he didn't mind watching it all over again tonight.

It wasn't long before Maddy started yawning and slowly falling asleep again.

"Come on, sweetie, you'll sleep better in bed," Jordan suggested, taking her in his arms and getting up from the couch.

"Will you stay with me?" she asked. "I'm afraid all alone."

"Of course I'll stay with you," Jordan told her, kissing her cheek. "Say goodnight to Taylor."

Maddy looked over Jordan's shoulder. "Goodnight, Taylor," she echoed obediently.

"Goodnight, Princess," Taylor answered. "I hope you sleep better."

When Jordan started heading away, Maddy asked him to stop in front of the tree. "It looks pretty all lit up, doesn't it?" he commented.

"Santa's gonna love it," she replied, nodding proudly.

"I'm sure he will, baby."

Taylor watched as they headed away in the darkness toward the bedroom, shaking his head sharply when he realized he'd been wondering if Santa would even see their tree at all. He turned off the TV and went to bed, hoping in spite of himself that perhaps Jordan would decide to spend Christmas in Edmonton after all.

Over the next few days spent recovering at home, Taylor tried not to dwell much on the holiday plans. He knew he should be happy for Jordan if he decided to take Maddy to see family. That was what Christmas was for, after all. Yet every time the twinkling lights of the tree caught his eye, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of disappointment at the thought of being alone. 

Thankfully, it wasn't long before he was cleared, first for contact, then to play, and there were things more important to concentrate on than Christmas trees that no one would put any presents under, and how illogically disappointing that felt. At the very least, he succeeded in keeping it to himself until the last possible moment.

"I guess you guys are flying out tomorrow?" Taylor asked Jordan as they got home after the game against the Wild — the last game before Christmas.

"Oh... No, we're staying here after all."

Taylor's eyes went wide, and he hoped that Jordan hadn’t noticed the look of relief that had likely crossed his face. "Seriously?"

"Yeah, well, it would have been nice," Jordan explained, "but it would have meant either flying back on the 25th with Maddy or leaving her with my folks in Calgary for a few days, possibly until January, and I'm not sure she would have liked that very much."

"Ah, yeah," Taylor agreed, "You could have given me a heads up, though."

"Oh... It's fine if you already have plans, you know," said Jordan, and Taylor could have sworn he sounded a bit disappointed.

The thought that he wasn’t going to be alone after all, that Jordan actually _wanted_ to spend Christmas with him, made happiness swell in his chest until it bubbled out in the form of a laugh. "Yeah, I don't think mooching off Jonesy counts as having plans. No, I meant, there's no food in the fridge, and...yeah, maybe I need to do some last minute shopping now?" He coughed, clearly on purpose, then laughed again.

"There's all day tomorrow for that," Jordan replied, obviously stifling a yawn. "Oh...and don't go crazy buying Madison more toys, okay? She's already got more than she knows what to do with."

"Dude, I'd have to be blind not to notice she does," said Taylor, amused still. "'night, Ebs," he added, hurrying to his bedroom to do some research for his unexpected, last-minute shopping.

~~~~~

Taylor wasn't used to having to wait until Christmas morning proper in order to open any gifts... But since there was no real way to explain to a child how Santa had actually come to their house _before_ midnight, and since there was no way he was going to be the one to lift the veil on that particular myth, he'd agreed to play along.

Since they had no real, special plans for Christmas Eve itself, Taylor had spent part of the afternoon locked up in his room, wrapping all the presents he'd gotten. He'd taken great care in wrapping them in a way that he could still remember which box was which, without having to put a gift tag on any of them. This way, he thought, Jordan wouldn't be able to differentiate between the ones that were for Maddy from the one that was for Jennifer or the two that were from Jordan himself. 

He'd set them all under the tree late that night, after Madison had finally gone to bed — she'd been a little overexcited all day, though very understandably so. Jordan had placed several gifts under the tree as well, and gone to bed a good hour before it was even midnight, leaving Taylor alone to watch whatever Christmas special could be found on TV.

He woke up with a start, suddenly feeling a hand on his shoulder. "What? What's wrong?" was his immediate reaction.

"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you," Jordan replied. "You fell asleep in front of the TV."

"Oh." Taylor looked around, then rubbed his eyes. "I guess I did... What time is it?"

"A little after two," said Jordan.

Taylor yawned, stretched, and then finally got up. "Guess I should go to bed now, eh?"

"Hang on a bit," said Jordan as he walked around the couch. "Sit down."

"Huh? Why?"

"Sit," Jordan insisted, sounding amused. He reached for a box under the tree and handed it to Taylor. "Merry Christmas," he said with a lopsided smile.

"Oh, uh..." Taylor took the small rectangular box, turning it over in his hands. 

"Well...don't just look at it, open it."

"Okay, okay," Taylor chuckled, ripping off the wrapping paper. He started laughing the moment he caught a glimpse of what was hidden underneath: a copy of the latest Call of Duty game — Xbox version.

"What? Bad choice?" 

And despite the fact that Jordan looked just about crushed, Taylor simply couldn't stop laughing. "That box," he finally managed to say, and he pointed to a similar-shaped box, wrapped in shiny golden paper. 

"This one?"

"Yeah, that one," said Taylor unable to stop laughing. "It's for you."

Jordan frowned at him, looking halfway between amused and annoyed. Then he began carefully unwrapping the box. A moment later, he was laughing too. "Awesome gift, man," he eventually said, smacking Taylor on the leg with the gift he'd just received — the exact same game he'd gotten Taylor, only this one for PlayStation.

"I know, right?" said Taylor, his laughter mostly under control. "We're such dorks!"

"Wouldn't have it any other way," Jordan replied, a smile tugging at his lips. He got up slowly, adding, "I'm going back to bed. 'Night Hallsy. Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas, Ebs," Taylor replied, smiling back fondly at Jordan's retreating figure. He put away the video games, thinking they could just return one next week, then went to bed.

A short few hours later, he felt the mattress give a sudden lurch underneath him.

"Taylor, Taylor, come!" Maddy exclaimed excitedly. "Santa left us presents!"

Taylor cracked an eye open, and the first thing he saw was a little blond girl in pink pajamas, sitting about an inch from his face. Before he had time to respond in any way, though, Jordan had walked into the room, grabbed his daughter and taken her off the bed.

"Madison," he said, "what did I _just_ tell you about jumping on people's bed when they're still sleeping?"

"But... Santa left presents..." she objected, pouting.

"Yes, but that's not a reason to—"

"Oh, relax, Ebs," Taylor cut in. "It's Christmas, and there are presents to open."

"There are presents!" Maddy echoed in a sing-song voice. 

Jordan put her down with a small sigh, and she sprinted out of the room. Meanwhile Taylor had slipped out of bed and was looking for a clean shirt and some pants to put on. 

"You know you're not supposed to excuse her behavior like that," Jordan complained.

"Aw, come on, man, don't be a scrooge," Taylor replied as he shimmed into his jeans. "She's two and a half, she's been aching for Santa to come for days now, and all she wants is to open her presents."

"Sure, but—"

"But it doesn't matter," Taylor insisted. "I'm kind of flattered she thought I needed to be there to open presents, honestly. So let's just go and do that, and tomorrow you can go back to being as strict as you like. Today it's Christmas."

"She'll end up spoiled," said Jordan, shaking his head.

"It's Christmas, Ebs," Taylor repeated before gently leading Jordan out of the room and toward the living room. 

"You know, I hate you sometimes," Jordan mumbled under his breath.

"Oh, bullshit, you love me," Taylor scoffed, eyes going fractionally wider after the fact as he realized just exactly what he'd said.

But Jordan immediately, almost automatically replied, "You wish," and Taylor let out the breath he'd been holding, thankful that nothing had come of his small, but potentially dangerous slip-up. 

Instead of dwelling on it — because he realized that yes, he did wish — Taylor forced himself to concentrate on all the shiny boxes sitting under the tree, and trying to remember which one was meant for whom.

~~~~~

Jordan was watching from up in the press gallery as Taylor tumbled to the ice, knocking down a couple of teammates, and crashed into the boards. He shook his head at the scene, not yet realizing that something awful had happened down there.

But when he saw the mad scrambling, the trainer rushing over, and oh goodness all the blood, Jordan's heart almost stopped.

He tried to remain calm as he left the press box and headed down to the locker room. Panicking wouldn't achieve anything. Panicking wasn't a normal reaction for him to have in the first place. Jordan wouldn't react so strongly to watching a teammate being injured, and people would most certainly notice. But this wasn't just any teammate it was Taylor, and...Taylor was, well... he was _special_. Not that anyone was supposed to know.

By some stroke of luck, the injury, for all that it was gruesome, had turned out to be relatively minor, and the Blue Jackets, somehow, had a plastic surgeon on staff who'd come in and stitched Taylor's forehead back together again. Jordan knew he should have returned to the press box — the sensible thing to do — since there was nothing he could do down here and since the injury wasn't too serious anyway, but he just needed to see his teammate and be certain before he could leave with his mind at peace.

The stitches done, Taylor had somehow decided he should get on a stationary bike and get warmed up for the game which had only just begun.

"Are you out of your mind?" Jordan complained. "Hallsy, you're not going to go out and play tonight."

"Oh please, like I'm the first guy to ever get a few stitches during a game!"

"A few? You have thirty stitches holding your forehead together, that's not a few, and they're not going to let you go back out there."

"Oh no? And why not?"

"Because you're bleeding, Taylor," Jordan told him, as dispassionately as he could manage while he carefully used a Kleenex to wipe a few drops of blood dripping down the side of Taylor's face, then offering him the tissue as proof.

Taylor cursed under his breath, getting off the bike. "Guess neither of us is playing tonight, then," he said, walking away, probably to find a trainer.

Jordan shook his head, biting back a remark about Taylor's hardheadedness. Then he returned to the press gallery and his seat, all the while berating himself for worrying so much. And over the next couple of days, listening to Taylor constantly complain about how hideous he looked now and how he might never look good again, Jordan couldn't stop wondering how he'd ever managed to fall for someone whose sole concern were his looks.

~~~~~

Taylor sighed, looking at his reflection in the small airplane window. He had one heck of a shiner around an eye he couldn't even open due to all the swelling, and the long row of stitches running down his forehead was just as swollen. He looked like Frankenstein; a monster, sown together from spare parts, that no one would ever love.

He'd hoped from some reassurance — he'd fished for it a little insistently, even — but all he'd gotten from Jordan instead were shrugs and eye rolls. As if he couldn't care less. Maybe he never really had in the first place. At least...not in the way Taylor would have liked him to.

Stretching his legs under the seat before him, Taylor crossed his arms and sighed again.

"What's wrong?" Jordan asked, nudging him with his shoulder.

"Nothing," said Taylor with a shrug. "It's late, we lost again, and I'm really, really fucking tired."

Jordan frowned at him, then finally said, "Just close your eyes and sleep."

"Your _eye_ , you mean?" Taylor mumbled, "Since one's already closed shut anyway." He didn't wait for a response, instead turned his back to Jordan, pulling the blanket over his shoulder and settling in to sleep. Or try to sleep. Pretend, even, if he needed to.

They got home much later, after a long flight and a silent drive. Taylor was too frustrated for chit-chat, even though Jordan kept shooting him glances and seemed a little more discouraged every time.

"Are you mad at me?" Jordan finally asked, as they walked inside the apartment.

"No, I told you, I'm just tired," said Taylor, continuing on toward his bedroom. He wasn't angry, really — at least, not at Jordan. He was just annoyed at himself. Maybe a little hurt, too, but that was only because he'd been dumb enough to start having feelings for someone who clearly didn't have any for him in return.

Unable to get any real sleep, Taylor had finally gotten up around six. He'd been sitting in the living room, staring blankly at the TV set, munching on a bowl of Rice Krispies, when Maddy walked up to him, looking only barely awake.

"Hey," Taylor greeted around a mouthful of cereal. "Why are you up so early?"

"I'm—" Maddy began then stopped abruptly, blinking at Taylor. Then suddenly, unexpectedly, she screamed and ran away.

"Oh, shit," Taylor muttered under his breath. He set his cereal bowl on the coffee table, his appetite suddenly lost. Before he could think of going after her, the guest room door opened up and Jennifer peeked out, looking rumpled by worried. 

"What's going on?" she asked.

"Nothing, it's okay," Taylor told her. "Maddy just..." He sighed. "She just saw me, that's all," he explained, gesturing to his black eye and stitched up forehead.

"Aw, poor thing," she replied, and the way she looked over to him, Taylor wondered a moment if she meant him or Maddy. "I told her you'd had an accident, but I guess she wasn't as prepared for it as I thought she was."

Taylor shrugged. "It's okay. I look horrible, I know."

"You'll heal, Taylor, don't worry," Jenn replied, yawning, before disappearing into her room again and closing the door.

Out of the corner of his eye, Taylor noticed Jordan standing at the end of the couch. He had Madison in his arms, her face buried in the crook of her father's neck.

"Sorry to wake you," Taylor said. "I didn't expect— I should have known, I guess. Anyway, I'm sorry..."

"You have nothing to be sorry about," Jordan replied. Then he put Maddy down, remaining crouched in front of her. "It's just Taylor, honey, look," he told her, and he gently turned her so she would be facing Taylor.

But Maddy wouldn't look. "I'm afraid," she replied in a small voice, eyes screwed tightly shut.

Taylor winced. Just what he needed: a roommate who didn't care, and whose daughter was now frightened to death of him. Maybe he should go hide at Jonesy's for the next few days...

Jordan whispered something to Maddy's ear, and she nodded, though she didn't open her eyes. "Come on, sweetie," Jordan told her, and she finally, very slowly opened her eyes to look.

For a very long moment, Taylor just sat there, reigning in his desire to get up and leave. He knew why he should stay, but that really didn't make it any fun at all to be gawked at and viewed as a monstrosity by a two-year old child. Perhaps especially by this two-year old child.

Twice, Maddy closed her eyes again before looking at Taylor once more. Then at Jordan's encouragement, she took a few steps in Taylor's direction. She stopped when she got to within about foot.

"I look ugly, don't I?" Taylor told her, taking a quick glance in Jordan's direction before concentrating his attention on Maddy again.

She nodded slowly, eyes glued to Taylor's forehead.

Behind her, Jordan helpfully supplied, "Jenn told you about the accident Taylor had, remember?"

Maddy nodded again. "Does it hurt?" she finally asked, slowly reaching with her hand toward Taylor's face, but pulling back before she was ever close enough to touch.

"A little bit," Taylor replied.

"I can kiss it better," Maddy suggested, taking a couple steps closer.

Taylor laughed softly, then bent down to be within reach of her. "I'm sure that'll help," he told her.

"You be gentle, Maddy, okay?" Jordan called to her. "Nice and careful, honey..."

Maddy hummed an affirmative, then touched her lips to Taylor's brow ever so lightly, making a kissing sound only after having pulled back. "All better now," she said, beaming at him.

"Thanks, Princess," said Taylor and he reached to hug her. "I'll be all cured in just a few days, you'll see. I'm sorry I look so scary."

"It's okay," she replied, nodding sharply. "I still love you."

Taylor blinked at her, stunned. Before he knew it, she'd turned away and left again.

"You all right?" Jordan asked, patting him on the shoulder. 

"Mmm? Oh, yeah, fine."

"Sorry about that... She knew, Jenn had told her and explained it to her, but I guess it's one thing to know and another to see it."

"Heh." Taylor shrugged. "I look like Frankenstein, of course she was going to be scared of me."

"Oh, relax, you don't look that bad," Jordan assured him, "And you'll be back to being your usual handsome self soon enough, you'll see." There was a lopsided smile on his face.

"That's what the doc says," said Taylor after a moment, unable to think of anything else to say. 

Perhaps he wasn't completely unlovable after all, he thought...

~~~~~

Jordan woke up with a start — he'd heard someone screaming. He jumped out of bed instinctively and ventured out of his bedroom.

He poked his head into Taylor's room. There wasn't a lot of light, but he could see Taylor was sitting up in his bed. "Was that you?" Jordan asked.

"Sorry, yeah... Nightmare."

"Must have been a bad one for you to scream that way..."

Taylor sighed. "It's the same one I keep having since last week," he admitted.

Frowning, Jordan walked into the room and came to sit on the edge of Taylor's bed. "What? Since Columbus?"

"Yeah," Taylor said, running a hand over his eyes, then slowly up and down the long, partially-healed scar on his forehead. "It always starts the same: I fall down on the ice, and then I see the skate coming toward my face," he started to explain, stopping to take a long, shaky breath. "Most of the time that's pretty much it and I wake up."

"But not tonight?"

Taylor shook his head. "Sometimes the blade takes out my eye..."

"Ouch."

"Yeah, no joke," Taylor replied, sounding a little rattled still. "It's the stupidest thing, really, because at the time I wasn't afraid at all. I mean, it happened so fast, I don't think I ever really saw the blade come at me, and I'm pretty sure it never occurred to me to be afraid. But now? Now I see the blade coming at me in slow motion, and I know it's going to hit, and I'm terrified because I can't move out of its way."

"Well, you're safe now, it was only a nightmare," said Jordan, patting Taylor on the shoulder.

"I know."

"I hope you sleep better," Jordan told him, getting up.

"I hope I sleep at all..." Taylor replied, sighing heavily. "I close my eyes and I can still see it, and it stresses me out so much, I usually can't sleep much after this."

"Seriously? Why didn't you tell me before?"

"Why would I have? It's not your problem."

"Yeah, but—" Jordan started, then shrugged. "Move over a little," he said instead.

Taylor frowned at him. "Move? Why?"

"Just move a bit, you knucklehead," Jordan insisted gently and gave Taylor a bit of a push toward the edge of the bed. "Clearly you need help getting your mind off this stuff, if it's stressing you out so much you can't sleep."

"What's moving away from the middle of my bed going to achieve exactly?" 

"It'll leave enough room for me," Jordan explained, laughing a little bit still. "So I can keep you company for a while, and we can just talk about...I dunno, whatever, until you fall asleep again."

"Oh. Uh... Okay," Taylor replied, sounding a little confused still, before finally sliding away enough to leave some room for Jordan who wasted no time climbing onto the bed. "Are you sure, though? Because it might be some time before I fall asleep again. You might be stuck here a while."

"I think you're wrong, but either way... It's nothing you wouldn't do for me."

Taylor shrugged. "I guess." He patted down his pillow, pulled the sheets up to his chin, then asked, "So, uh...what do you want to talk about?" He seemed nervous somehow.

"Whatever you feel like?"

"I dunno..." Taylor replied, staring at the ceiling like he was thinking things over for a little while. "Did you freak out at all when you found out Christine was pregnant?"

"Kinda, yeah," Jordan laughed in reply. "I thought she was joking." 

He talked for a while about the experience, until he realized that Taylor wasn't responding much at all anymore, and drifting off to sleep. Jordan yawned and slowly started to get up to go back to his own room and his own bed. The movement, however, seemed to startle Taylor, so with a small sigh, Jordan stretched out on the bed again. 

When he woke up, several hours later, he was lying on his side, Taylor's shoulder and arm pressed against his back. It felt warm and nice and...a little bit wrong, too. Jordan rubbed at his eyes and got up, not bothering to check whether or not the shift of the mattress had woken Taylor or not this time, and he padded back into his own bedroom, crashing into his bed feeling just the faintest tinge of disappointment.

~~~~~

Twice again in the following weeks, Taylor had nightmares so vivid he'd woken up screaming. Both times he'd eventually ended up with Jordan lying beside him, telling him random stories about his life until he fell asleep again — and both times, come morning, Taylor had found himself alone again. Alone, feeling a little abandoned, and angry at himself for it. 

But then by mid-February, the nightmares had gone away, and things had gone back to normal again. Perhaps not _completely_ normal, but at least back to a state where Taylor could more easily pretend he didn't have any feelings for his teammate, which was about as normal as he could hope for things to be.

A bunch of the guys had gone out for beers after a game, to celebrate Whits' birthday, and to a lesser extent, to drown their sorrows after a crushing loss against Vancouver. By ten, most of the guys had already left — there was an early practice in the morning, and a flight to catch in the afternoon. Taylor was nursing a beer he probably shouldn't have ordered, and Jordan was starting to look like he might be about to fall asleep. Taking pity on him, Taylor suggested they should probably leave as well.

They piled up into a cab, the two of them plus Nuge who had not so smartly mixed beer and painkillers, and headed back home. They had planned to have the driver take their rookie teammate back to Jonesy's place, after dropping them off, but Ryan had dozed off on the way, drooling all over Jordan's shoulder, so ultimately, they'd just dragged him inside the apartment with them.

It had taken the both of them quite a bit of effort to finally manage to get Ryan out of his clothes and into bed without waking everyone else up. There was too much of a chance he'd roll off the couch and fall flat on his face if they left him there for the night, so they'd put him in Taylor's room instead. Besides, this way if he woke up in the middle of the night, he wouldn't have very far to go to find the bathroom, and wouldn't mistakenly end up in Jennifer's room instead.

"I guess this means you're crashing with me," Jordan commented, sounding amused, as they headed out of Taylor's bedroom, closing the door behind them.

For a moment, Taylor debated answering that he probably shouldn't, but when it occurred to him that, this time, Jordan would still be there with him come morning, Taylor pushed every argument against right out of his mind. He'd had too much to drink tonight to really care that he'd regret it his decision in the morning. He'd had too much to drink tonight to remember why sleeping in the same bed was such a bad idea in the first place.

Instead, he said, "Yup," grinned (possibly a little stupidly at that) and followed Jordan into his bedroom.

"Careful not to wake her," Jordan whispered, as he tucked Maddy in her little bed, picking up the teddy bear that had fallen to the floor and setting it next to her on the pillow.

"Wouldn't dream of it," Taylor whispered back.

Within minutes they were in bed as well, and drifting off to sleep. 

~~~~~

Taylor woke up, feeling the mattress shifting very suddenly at his feet. His eyes flew open and the first thing he saw was a little blonde girl in pink pajamas crawling on her belly, moving up the empty space in the middle of the bed. He smiled when she looked at him, and she stopped her ascension.

"Did you have a nightmare again?" she asked him as she sat up on her knees between Taylor and Jordan who had also woken up now.

"No sweetie," Taylor said, and he reached to pat her little head. "They're all gone now."

"Oh." Madison looked from Taylor to her father, then back again, face scrunched up in thought. Eventually, she asked, "Are you in love?"

"What?" Jordan asked in a surprised chuckle. "Where did you get that idea?"

"From Jenn's show," Maddy told him. "Robin and Patrick sleep in the same bed because they're in love."

Jordan looked over to Taylor, his expression seemed to be begging for help. Taylor just shrugged and got out of bed. Walking out of the room, he heard Jordan explain to his daughter that sometimes people slept in the same bed for other reasons, too. Taylor fully expected that the next thing his teammate would tell his daughter was that no, no, they weren't in love at all, and he really didn't want to hear him say it. 

Taylor padded into the kitchen, then opened the fridge door and peered inside for a moment. He closed the door when he realized he'd been absently staring at the orange juice container. He didn't know why he was standing there, save for the fact that he didn't have much of anywhere else to go. Sighing, he started making coffee — he was likely going to need a lot to get through the day.

The previous day's newspaper was still sitting on the counter, so he grabbed it, intending to toss it in the recycling bin, but stopped mid-motion when he noticed there were circles around a couple of the ads on the front page of the classifieds section. Ads for apartments to rent.

It felt like the world had just tilted on its axis. And yet, at the same time, he should have expected it. Of course Jordan would want to move to a different place, especially if Maddy was going to be around next fall, as he'd suggested might happen. Should Taylor move out, then this place wasn't necessarily too small for them anymore, but knowing Jordan he probably figured it should be him moving out instead.

Either way, Taylor knew this was it; he'd be on his own next season. No more Jenn, no Maddy, and way less Jordan than he'd ever been used to before. He was losing his family. Not that it had really ever been his, except in his mind, and in his heart.

"Well, that was interesting," Jordan said, abruptly pulling Taylor out of his musings. 

"You can't really blame her for coming to that conclusion, you know. Half our teammates think we're secretly dating."

"Well, half our teammates are idiots."

"Possibly," Taylor chuckled. Then, before he'd had time to convince himself that it might be a bad idea to do so, he asked, "Would it be so bad, though, if it were true?"

Jordan frowned for a moment before replying, "I suppose I could probably do a lot worse."

"Coffee is ready," Taylor said, grabbing mugs from the cupboard. "Want some?"

"I hope it's strong."

"Strong enough to kick your ass," Taylor joked as he fixed them each a mug. As he offered Jordan one, he asked, "So...would you date me, then?" 

This time, Taylor was fully aware of the risk he was taking. There was a chance he wasn't going to like the answer he would get, but all things considered, if Jordan was moving away anyhow, Taylor figured he probably didn't have anything to lose now — he'd already pretty much lost everyone he cared for already, he knew.

"No, of course not," said Jordan, looking at him as though he'd suddenly lost his mind. "What would be the point in that? You're straight."

"What if I wasn't, though?"

Jordan rolled his eyes. "If you weren't, you would have been dating girls for as long as I've known you."

"Okay, fine, I like girls," Taylor admitted, sighing. "Except... Except, well, dammit, Ebs, I like you _more_."

"What? Really?" Jordan replied, clearly surprised. "Why—? Why didn't you ever tell me this before?"

"Because," said Taylor with a shrug. "Because I thought you had a girlfriend before," he explained. "Of course it turned out you didn't and you had Maddy instead, but... anyway..."

"Wait, but... that—" Jordan began, frowning deeply. "That was last year. Last season, even."

"Well, yeah."

Jordan set his coffee mug on the countertop. "Are you shitting me, because I swear—"

"I'm not," Taylor cut in, setting his own mug down. "I promise, I'm serious. I'm just... " He shrugged, feeling suddenly incredibly self-conscious. "I'm just a dork who's only now worked up the courage to tell you he's been falling for you for... well... for a long time."

"Oh," Jordan breathed out, and for the longest time he just looked back at Taylor, mouth slightly open, like he was trying to process everything. As Taylor started to seriously worry he was about to have his heart stomped right over, Jordan smiled lopsidedly and finally said, "Then I guess that makes two of us, because I— I've been trying very hard to convince myself I wasn't in love with you, for several months now."

"So we're both dorks..." Taylor began, and Jordan nodded. "And we're both—" he went on, but the rest of his thought remained unsaid. 

"Yeah..." Jordan whispered back, smiling still. He stepped forward, tentatively reaching to place a hand on Taylor's shoulder. "Hallsy?"

Taylor let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. He grabbed fistfuls of Jordan's shirt with both hands, pulling him in. "Oh, fuck, Ebs," he said, crushing their lips together in a desperate kiss.

The sound of a door creaking open all of a sudden forced them to pull apart. They stared at one another, eyes wide, breathing heavily.

"Hmmm, I think—" Taylor began, "We should probably stop, or Nuge is going to see us, and then...we'll probably never hear the end of it, I expect."

Jordan chuckled. "Yeah, right, but..." He looked around, then grabbed Taylor's wrist and dragged him into the laundry room. "Much as I don't want him to know, I'm pretty sure I can't just stop now," he explained before giving the door a soft nudge and reaching up to kiss Taylor again.

Just moments later, the door flew open and they broke apart once more, startled and nervous.

"I found you!" Maddy announced happily.

"You did, honey, well done," Jordan replied, a little embarrassed as he picked his daughter up. 

"My turn to hide," she said, smiling brightly.

"In just a minute, okay?" Jordan told her. "Sweetie, remember when you asked why we were sleeping in the same bed earlier?" Maddy nodded, and he went on, somewhat hesitantly, "Do you think it would be alright if Taylor came to sleep in my room more often?"

Madison looked to Taylor for a moment, frowning in thought. "Do you love my daddy?" she asked, very seriously.

"Yeah, Princess, I do," Taylor nervously replied.

A big smile lit up Maddy's face, and she turned to her father. "Alright," she said, nodding solemnly. She started to squirm in his arms almost immediately afterward. "My turn to hide now!" she squealed happily, and Jordan let he down again.

"Okay, that was a lot easier than I expected," Taylor commented, watching Maddy run out of the room.

"That's 'cause she already adores you," said Jordan in a chuckle.

"Your kid really has great taste."

Jordan smiled a little crookedly. "C'm'ere," he said, kicking the door closed, all the way this time. "Let me see what you taste like again..."

~~~~~

_Two years later..._

Taylor stretched, yawning. "Hey there," he said, pressing a small kiss at the nape of Jordan's neck.

Jordan slowly turned to face Taylor. "Morning," he said. "How long do you think we have?"

"Five minutes?" Taylor replied, nuzzling at Jordan's jaw. "If we're lucky?"

A moment later, there was a quick knock at the door. "Are you awake yet?" Maddy asked excitedly.

"Or not," Jordan very quietly said. Then louder he called, "You can come in, honey, it's okay."

Their bedroom door swung open, and Maddy walked in, already half dressed in her winter gear.

"There's snow outside!" she exclaimed, beaming. "Lots and lots of snow! Get up, I wanna go play!"

"Give us a minute, Princess, okay?" Taylor told her, slowly sitting up.

"Hurry, hurry," she replied, leaving the room.

"There's snow," Jordan told Taylor with an exaggerated expression of delight.

"Lots of it," Taylor replied, laughing. He got up and started pulling on a pair of jeans.

"You think we could handle another like her?" Jordan asked, seemingly out of the blue.

"Why? Does she have a twin I don't know about?"

"No, no, of course not." Jordan sighed. "In her letter to Santa, Maddy asked for a little brother..."

Taylor laughed wholeheartedly. "You realize there's no way we could possibly make anything like that happen between now and Christmas anyway, right?"

"Well yeah, maybe not for Christmas, but... I don't know, once the season is over, maybe we could look into that? I mean...if you think there's any space left in your heart for another."

"Mmmm... I don't know. You and Maddy take up a lot of space in there already," Taylor said, very seriously. Then he smiled lopsidedly and added, "But I guess there might be _some_ room left for another little monster."

"Yeah?" Jordan asked, grabbing Taylor's arm and pulling him back down on the bed again.

They were kissing when Madison walked into their room for the second time.

"Ewww!" she complained. "Could you be less in love and more dressed up now? I wanna go play in the snow!"

"Baby, you don't have to wait for us to go play in the backyard, you know," said Jordan, looking up at her.

Maddy sighed heavily. Then, pouting, explained, "But I'm not strong enough to slide the door open all my myself. Please can you hurry up and come open it for me?" She left again, without waiting for a proper response.

Chuckling, Taylor got up and grabbed the first shirt within arm's length. "I'll go," he said, "before she decides she'd rather have a new set of dad's for Christmas..."

He was standing in front of the patio door a few minutes later, watching as Maddy started the build a snowman in their backyard.

"You really think we could handle a second one?" Jordan asked, joining him there.

"Another like her?" Taylor replied, amused. "Definitely not! A little boy, though, I think we probably could."

"I'd like that..." Jordan replied, taking Taylor's hand in his own and brining it up to brush a small kiss on his fingers. 

After a moment spent silently looking out into the yard, Taylor cocked his head to the side and said, "You know, there's enough space in this yard to build a rink... we could teach them how to skate."

"Oh, good idea. You show them how to skate, I'll teach them how to score goals."

Taylor laughed. " _You_ will? Really? Remind me who had more goals last season?"

"You're right," Jordan replied, leaning in for a quick kiss. "We'll ask Stamkos if he'll tutor our kids," he added before walking away.

"You're a dork, Eberle!" Taylor called out after him.

"Maybe," Jordan agreed, "But you love me..."

Taylor smiled fondly at Jordan's retreating figure. "With all my heart," he whispered to himself, turning back to check on their daughter again.

 

>End.


End file.
